Originally Posted by Maelochs

I most likely have more experience with the police than most posters here. Far from all of it was good. I have met every kind of cop from the ones who lie on the stand to the ones that will give you a real break to the kinds which are only there to make things better for everybody.

In my experience, it is people who have difficulties with the notion of “authority’ who have the most negative view of cops—even if none of their thinking is based on actual experience.

It is the people who never came to terms with being a sovereign individual in a world full of individuals and groups of individuals—a lot of people who couldn’t manage their relationship with their fathers, teachers, etc.—who have all the trouble. These are the folks always looking for someone external to blame—the police, the government, whoever. They always feel like they have to act big, because they are not secure enough to be both decisive and vulnerable.

Mostly angry, mostly angry because inside they are scared.

There are some bad cops. There are some awesome cops. Most are just people—another thing a lot of anti-cop people forget.

Most people who have trouble with cops simply are not mature enough to be intelligent when interacting with cops—they cause their own problems. Not always—myself and at least two people I know of have been screwed by cops lying on the stand. But … in a huge number of interactions, both personal and vicarious, I still see that most cops are decent and honest. Act right, they respond right.

I have been robbed at gunpoint while just walking down the street, by a pair of black guys, but if I said, “Black guys are dangerous and evil,” everyone would get on me—and rightly so. But people who are afraid of police can say that about police and nobody seems to say, “That is simply your personal problem in one situation.”

Cops are sadly, a necessity. Criminals won’t go away if there are no cops.

I used to tell people, “Move to Somalia.” Now maybe Libya might be a better option … but move anywhere where there Are no cops, no effective power structure … where gangs of kids with machine guns control the streets and older gangsters control the kids.

Go see what it is like when there is no medicine in the hospitals, there is no fire department, no police, no ambulance … where any time you get anything more than subsistence quantities of anything, you are robbed. Tell me how wonderful it is it not have to deal with cops.

Or … tell me how it feels to have your bike stolen, and No One Cares.

Are there bad cops? I have met some. Does that mean cops are bad? Only to people who have not addressed their own issues and project them outward.

There are bad cyclists, too, from salmon ninjaing to kids who ride around carrying guns and selling drugs. But if I said “All cyclists are criminal and hoodlums,” nobody would tolerate that here.

Well .. I have met more than my share, in all kinds of situations … and I won’t accept it when people say “Cops are bad.”

Save your energy to fix the real problems. Find the few bad cops. Do whatever … but grow up and solve your personal problems before you try to solve everyone else’s, eh?